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Paralyzed painter depicts country stars from wheelchair

WEBSTER, N.Y. -- There's a country song by Carrie Underwood, "Jesus, Take the Wheel," that Richard Masters has often listened to while he paints in the basement of his home. It's the story of a frazzled mother

Paralyzed painter depicts country stars from wheelchair

Richard Masters has used his brush and bite to create portraits of Carrie Underwood and Tim McGraw.

Richard Masters, 23, of Webster, N.Y., is paralyzed from the neck down. But with help from his aunt Deborah Sapienza, he creates his works of art by holding a paintbrush in his mouth.(Photo: Gannett/Carlos Ortiz, Rochester Democrat , Chronicle)

WEBSTER, N.Y. -- There's a country song by Carrie Underwood, "Jesus, Take the Wheel," that Richard Masters has often listened to while he paints in the basement of his home. It's the story of a frazzled mother driving home for Christmas, distracted from the important things in her life — like the baby sleeping in the back seat — until a skid on the icy road brings her near to disaster and jolts her back in touch.

Masters' car accident 19 years ago didn't end as well. He's been a quadriplegic since age 5, when a dump truck blew through a stop sign and smashed into the car his mother was driving. But the struggles he's faced, and his remarkable talent for painting, have put him on a positive path.

He was 5 years old on Columbus Day, 1994, when his mother bundled him and his sister into the car to go to a playground near their home.

They approached an intersection just a few hundred yards from their house, and Richard was looking out the rear passenger window. He likely saw the dump truck barrel through a stop sign and smash into the car.

The impact did not break his neck but stretched and twisted his spinal cord so his head was facing backward. Doctors in Rochester told Lynn Masters her son likely wouldn't last 48 hours.

She had him transferred to a hospital in Buffalo, where the prognosis improved slightly: from death to life in a permanent vegetative state.

She had him transferred again, this time to the Alfred I. duPont Hospital for Children in Wilmington, Del., where doctors put a shunt in his brain to relieve the pressure.

Within an hour, he was speaking to her. Within three days, he was driving a motorized wheelchair.

"Many times they told me to say goodbye to him," Lynn Masters said. "They told me he would be a complete vegetable. And now look."

Now, he's 23 years old, a grown man who's overcome near-complete paralysis and made a name for himself as an artist.

He grips the paintbrush by clamping his teeth on the end of an 8-inch stick and moving his head side to side. His aunt, artist Deborah Sapienza, mixes the paint and holds the canvas, but Masters retains artistic control.

He has no motion from his neck down, but can move his head smoothly enough to put expression in eyes, movement in hair and rich patterns in the background.

Country singer/songwriter Carrie Underwood signed a print from her portrait by Webster, N.Y., artist Richard Masters, 23, who is paralyzed from the neck down, but holds a paintbrush in his mouth to create pieces like this one. Masters makes portraits of country music singers, giving them to the artists backstage.(Photo: CARLOS ORTIZ staff photographer)

He began painting almost immediately after his recovery from the accident as a way to maintain flexibility above his neck. But it wasn't until he started working with veteran high school art teacher Bill Stephens that his talents truly began to blossom.

In nearly four decades of teaching, Stephens had never worked with a paralyzed student. He tried using one of Masters' mouthsticks himself and quickly realized it was a special skill.

The two met in Stephens' free periods for one-on-one lessons they both recall fondly.

"I always thought of him as a Buddha, actually," Stephens said. "When he came into the room his presence was so beautiful. ... . There were times we were working and we'd just start laughing and he'd spit that mouthstick right out. We just enjoyed each other's company."

Masters began with floral prints and still lifes, but decided shortly after graduating from high school to combine his artistic talent with his love of country music. He did a portrait of singer Tim McGraw and presented it to him in person backstage at a concert last summer.

His next subject was dearer to his heart: Carrie Underwood, the phenom singer/songwriter whose music had touched him so deeply.

He met her backstage as well, then sat front-row at her concert in Buffalo in March, where she thanked him from the stage. His next projects are singers Jason Aldean and Toby Keith.

Masters hasn't drawn a breath on his own for 18 years, and never will. He occasionally lands back in the hospital with various complications and has three full-time aides, including his mother, at his side around the clock.

He doesn't like when people stare at him; he doesn't like riding in cars. He gets vicious muscle spasms that shake his body and ruin his sleep.

But those who know him say he radiates positivity, always thinking of others first and reaching out in his own way.

"Most people go through life complaining," Sapienza said. "He doesn't. He's really a joy to be around."

"It's a hard life, but he handles it with a lot of grace," said Marie Vandermark, one of his nurses.

He basks in the sun when it's warm and watches NASCAR races and DVDs when it isn't. He's considering a return to the still lifes he started with, and a possible public exhibit of his work.

"All the lousy stuff I've been through — it's a lot for me to take on sometimes," Masters said. "But I try to make everybody laugh. I try not to be a crabby person."

He paints every week with his aunt: bite and brush, bite and brush. Through the exercise in collaboration, repeated over and over again, a face takes shape on the canvas.

It's an act of creation by a man who was nearly destroyed, a time of peace and laughter and country music that overwhelm the constant ambient hum of his ventilator, nebulizer and oxygen reader.

Masters and Sapienza confer on color choices and he takes up the mouthpiece again, grinning between brush strokes like Bill Stephens' Buddha. He paints, and his work comes to life.